1. Field
The following description relates to technology for managing multicast and broadcast service (MBS) zones, and more particularly, to an apparatus and method for managing variable MBS zones in an MBS server.
2. Description of the Related Art
A mobile Internet protocol television (IPTV) service is technology for increasing the convenience of users based on the mobility and interactive service function of mobile Internet, and has become a main service of the fourth generation (4G) mobile communication system. IPTV service is being researched and developed together with various wireless environment technologies and services.
Mobile IPTV service is a service for providing broadcast service even while moving, and is a service in which broadcast and communication are merged. To this end, in WiMAX and IEEE 802.16, various wireless access technologies are being standardized, and, proposed has been a seamless broadcast service using an MBS zone in details of standardization which are being performed.
The MBS zone fundamentally provides a group of several base stations as the same service zone. In the same MBS zone, multicast parameters are shared, and thus, even though a base station moves, service is provided without having to perform a reset process. The MBS is a specification for transferring data from one data source to a plurality of users, in a mobile network.
According to the MBS, the mobile network provides a point-to-multipoint service that transmits data from one data source to a plurality of users, and thus, network resources are shared, and a network resource use rate increases.
The MBS proposed to date realizes multicast and broadcast of a low-speed message, and moreover, realizes multicast and broadcast of a high-speed multimedia message.
However, in a range to which a broadcast zone is applied, there are many cases in which a user's active region is limited to within an MBS zone, and, in a high-quality multimedia service with the consideration of a mobile environment, there is a limitation in assuring Quality of Service (QoS) with the existing proposed standard.
That is, in setting an MBS zone that provides the existing mobile IPTV service, since a manager sets the MBS zone by using a static method according to an internal constant policy, channels are wasted in an unnecessary zone, and problems such as unnecessary MBS handover, are caused in a constantly moving user environment.
The inefficient management of MBS zones has limitations in the efficient use of channels, and causes ineffective MBS handover due to user movement between MBS zones, causing a decrease in service quality due to handover delay to users. Moreover, since content preference and user movement propensity are not considered, problems such as inefficiency can occur in use of MBS channels.
For this reason, the inventor started to conduct research on technology that, by variably setting an MBS zone based on a characteristic where user movement between MBS zones and content preference are changed depending on time and environment, enables a safer and faster shift of an MBS zone, and thus effectively provides high-quality multimedia service in a mobile environment.